London Olympics: The Most Embarrassing Opening Ceremony?

Anthony Wing Kosner
, ContributorQuantum of Content and innovations in user experienceOpinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

The firework display of the glowing rings in the brief video above was thrilling and well-executed, but otherwise, this evening's opening ceremony from the Olympics in London was positively cringe-inducing. I'm sure some of the less self-conscious performers were having a good time, but some must have wondered why they were there.

Unlike the awesome (and a bit terrifying) display of synchronized drumming and acrobatics from the Beijing games in 2008, that attempted to symbolize the entire Chinese industrial economy, there was no obvious talent or social organization in the London mob. The overwhelming feeling was of a desperate mediocrity. And it was boring.

LONDON — With its hilariously quirky Olympic opening ceremony, a wild jumble of the celebratory and the fanciful; the conventional and the eccentric; and the frankly off-the-wall, Britain presented itself to the world Friday night as something it has often struggled to express even to itself: a nation secure in its own post-empire identity, whatever that actually is.

How could I be so far off base? Those kids in their "crazy" costumes moving quickly through awkward and under-rehearsed dance moves to a potpourri of Brit hits were "celebratory" and "eccentric." The giant house-as-telly playing the greatest moments of British TV and movies in center stage was "off-the-wall." Tim Berners-Lee inventing the internet (which enables these "wild" youth to IM each other and fall in love) is a symbol of "a nation secure in its own post-empire [and post-industrial] identity."

Oh really? I know that I've written about the benefits of freedom for design, but this wasn't freedom or creative anarchy. This was just awful!